Govt report card logs UK hacking conviction success rate Sixty-one of the 108 people prosecuted under UK hacking laws between 2003 and 2007 were convicted. The number of successful prosecutions under the Computer Misuse Act came in a written parliamentary answer by Claire Ward, junior minister at the Ministry of Justice, in response to a question from Cardiff Lib Dem MP Jennifer …
I have a suspicion that the number of people required to draft, edit, amend, review, vote, and sign-off this law far exceeded the number of prosecutions. It would be great to have a league table of criminal laws listed by number of prosecutions and convictions. We could then set government the goal of excising the 100 least 'popular' laws every year.
These are *Magistrates* court prosecutions, not a proper court, a magistrate isn't even a judge, and not of sufficient seriousness to use the lapdog extradition treaty which was intended only FOR SERIOUS CRIMES LIKE TERRORISM, not petty magistrates crimes.
"Information showing the number of persons proceeded against at magistrates courts and found guilty at all courts for offences under the 1990 Computer Misuse Act in England and Wales from 2003 to 2007 (latest available) is shown in the following table. Data for 2008 will be available towards the end of 2009."
The treaty is broken because it leaves the protection of UK citizens to the Home Secretary and he can't see any votes in it.
An old colleague got done by his previous employer for supposedly stealing data, when he took the backup drive home as an offsite backup. They knew he'd been doing this as he'd been doing it for years and they authorised it (albeit not written unfortunately). When he said he was fed up and decided to leave they accused him of stealing company data, and he was taken to court. He was told he risked jail unless he pleaded guilty so felt he had to- because having no chance to go to jail and a criminal record is better than having a chance of going to jail and a criminal record or not, even though he'd done nothing wrong. Without evidence his employer had allowed him to use his own house to take the drive to as an offsite backup because they only ever authorised it verbally what could he do? It was their word against his, and they could prove he'd taken the drive home as they got the police involved, whilst he had no proof it was authorised.
If it can happen to one person, I'm sure it can happen to many more. What's the bet out of those 61 a good bunch of them are forced guilty pleas like in this case too?
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